The Bemused Gardener

Garden interrupted ...

2010-09-07T11:04:00.000-07:00

Sad garden news today, I'm afraid: due to a series of very complex and upsetting circumstances which have happened over the last few days, we have had no option but to withdraw our offer on the house, and with it the garden, so we are back to being garden-free, alas. Ah well! The best-laid plans, as they say ...

There is however a lower offer, plus conditions, on the table in order to ensure the same situation doesn't happen again if the vendors decide they do want to take the selling process seriously after all, but I don't think they're quite ready to do that yet. Maybe a long, long way from being ready!

In the meantime, we have decided to spruce up our flat ready for the market and, when that's done, have a good look round at gardens (with houses attached!) in the local area. It has surprised us just how much stuff there is around that we can (gosh!) even afford, so watch this space.

But we must for the moment wave a fond farewell to our "foster garden" and look forward to having one of our own some day soon ...

Anne Brooke

A flower by any other name ...

2010-09-04T07:42:00.000-07:00

We were somewhat bamboozled by the bizarre onion art going on in Gardeners' World last night - goodness knows why anyone would want to store onions in great bundles tied to string in a very tenuous fashion which are bound to injure the first child that plays underneath them - all very strange, but someone must like it ...

Anyway, the heuchera are doing well, you'll be pleased to hear, and the odd stick-like plants appear to have more leaves on them. Not only that but there are one or two white flowers on the choisya (ten points to anyone who can tell us how we should be pronouncing that - as we have already humiliated ourselves in a garden centre by saying "cotoneaster" as it looks, which prompted a sigh from a nearby really rather rude assistant who said with a grimace: cot-own-ee-aster. Well, now we know then, thanks, but some customer skills here and there wouldn't go amiss, madam ...). Anyway, this is a choisya ("k" or "ch"?)

And the potentilla also has some nice yellow flowers coming out:

Today, K and I have had great fun wandering around Hinton Ampner, which is really very stunning and the cakes are scrumptious, hurrah. So I have now decided that I would love a lily pond, a sand-pit and a summer house with columns, but K continues to look dubious ... I fear that the chickens in the garden option is a no-no too! Ah well.

Anne Brooke

A minty moment

2010-09-01T12:23:00.000-07:00

We've had fun today with the mint:

It's been hanging up in the spare room for a couple of days or so now and is now in ... wait for it ... mint condition. Hurrah! All perfectly dried out. So we've taken it down and stored it in the required air-tight container, as specified in Gardeners' World, and now all we can smell is mint. It's very intense stuff.

We've even had some in our mashed potato tonight - mmm, lovely ... And I'm wondering if I can make mint tea somehow. From the smell I suspect it's spearmint and apparently that's the most commonly grown garden mint variety so I may even be right.

Anyway, all this makes us feel very much "back to nature" and I'm wondering what we can use in our cooking next.

Anne Brooke

Figs and sticks

2010-08-30T08:12:00.000-07:00

Since fostering a garden, with potential adoption close on the horizon, K and I have become obsessive garden visitors. Yesterday we had a good look around The Savill Garden which is part of The Royal Landscape - my, how posh! - and very nice it is too. What a lot of hydrangeas and hostas there are. The Queen must love 'em.

Today, we visited Nymans, so we are really well gardened for the moment.

As a result of our visit, we think we've identified more of our mystery plants. We have spiraea (which is rather like sedums but the leaves are different):

Our spiraea flowers aren't quite like they are in the picture now as they've all died off and left brown petals so it's not as pleasant, but we're looking forward to next summer to see how it does.

For reference, here below is a picture of a sedum, which we also have in our garden, but again it's past its best:

The flower shapes are sort of similar so you can see our confusion ...

Whilst visiting other people's gardens, we also found out that the large pot plant that we are looking after for our dead neighbour is probably a fig tree, whereas the smaller one might well be a hosta. You never know, though we're more confident about the fig. It's massive really and makes our stairwell look like a small forest. It's tricky squeezing past it in the mornings ...

Meanwhile, as a result of my stepfather's expertise, we've discovered that the creeper making its way up our potential summerhouse is definitely a winter flowering jasmine, so that will be fun seeing the flowers come out, I hope:

I'm also pleased to announce that our heuchera appear to be doing well and are making a lovely splash of colour on the furthest flowerbed. The other excitement is that, in the same bed, there have been some dead-looking stick things which we have been merrily stepping through in order to sort out the buddleia (which I am still pruning by the way), and now they actually have a whole lot of new leaves on them, well gosh! We think they must have been eaten by a deer coming through from the wood but, now we've shut the gate, whatever plants they are have taken the chance to fight back. We're wondering if it's not too late for some flowers too, as that will help us sort out what they might be. Here's hoping the deer don't battle their way back in before we find out ...

And we've taken a tip from last week's episode of Gardeners' World and have brought in a handful of mint sprigs which we are now drying out by hanging above my exercise bike so we can add them to things through the winter when they're properly dried. They're making the room smell lovely and giving me new zest in the mornings, hurrah!

Anne Brooke

The joys of compost and tomatoes

2010-08-27T05:07:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the lovely Sue, I now have a wonderful composting link from our local council - discount composters! It's definitely the way forward, and there are lots of lovely pictures to admire. We could have this:

Which I don't think is an actual composter, but it looks very cute anyway. Or we could go mad and have this:

Which you have to twirl round once a day in order to obtain composting in 21 days. Now that sounds like fun ... Though it's not the cheapest of gadgets and I don't know where we'd put it.

In the meantime, I must really prune the buddleia, which should look like this:

But sadly doesn't ... but I'm waiting for a gap in the raindrops before I venture out. Perhaps it's a task for the weekend?

In the meantime, we have Gardeners' World on TV tonight to look forward to - and apparently we're going to be told how to grow plants on sheds. My question is: why would you want to? Perhaps to soften the look? Though I'd have thought some of said plants might be too heavy and the poor shed would collapse. All will indeed be revealed ...

To end, K's answer to my question this morning - what would you like to do in the garden this weekend, darling? - was this: I'd like to sit quietly and be a tomato ... Well, there's no answer to that, really.

Anne Brooke

Portugal poison

2010-08-25T09:58:00.000-07:00

We have identified another mystery plant in our potential garden:

It's a Portugal laurel, and very pretty indeed with its red stems and contrasting green leaves. K took a cutting a couple of days ago and has been playing around with it in the kitchen since then trying to find out what it is. Well, now we know. We also discover that if the leaves are crushed or burnt, it releases cyanide into the atmosphere which may of course explain why I felt so exhausted last night and had to go to bed early! Though I suspect that's just me in all honesty. Suffice it to say we won't be crushing or burning it, and we certainly won't be eating the berries it's supposed to produce at some stage ... But it is very pretty.

So, what with the huge amounts of rosemary bushes in the garden (which are also poisonous if taken in large quantities, especially for pregnant women I believe), we are developing our own little version of the perfectly marvellous Alnwick Poison Garden - we just don't have the cascading water features or the style, yet ...

But there's still time! We've had a look at some Beginners' Garden courses at Wisley and they look like fun. If only they'd put the brochure for the second half of the year up, we could really get excited, but at the moment it only goes as far as July, groan. I've sent them an email (well, I am a member, you know ...) but have yet to hear.

Anne Brooke

Tea on the lawn

2010-08-24T12:15:00.000-07:00

Had a lovely few moments after work when I came back and, instead of going straight up to the flat as usual, I wandered around the garden for a while, watering the heuchera. I think Georgie is doing rather better than Rose, but I hope Rose perks up soon. I don't really want a droopy heuchera. Perhaps I should start talking to them.

Then, joy of joys, K came home and we both pottered around the garden drinking mugs of herbal tea. Double bliss. We even did a spot of impromptu weeding - how very "country", dahlings. Really the garden is lovely in the evening - heck I could get used to this kind of life. I hope we get the chance to.

Anne Brooke

New looks at old plants

2010-08-23T10:08:00.000-07:00

We both think this is a lovely version of a hydrangea:

Ain't it grand? And I always thought hydrangeas were so dull. More fool me. Our neighbour has one and we found out yesterday when we visited an Open Garden that it's called a hydrangea villosa. Stunning. That's definitely on the list.

And we might well be needing one as, upon accurate measurement, our potential garden is actually 52' wide by 40' long. Well gosh. It looks smaller as the garden is on a slope upward from the house and as it also includes half a shed, the summer-house and three and a half beds. But still, gosh.

We're also thinking of putting up an ornamental hedge of some description at the bottom of the garden before the woods start as the fencing there at the moment is quite ugly. The only thing is will it stop the deer getting in or will they eat it? If anyone knows any ornamental hedges hated by deer, do let us know!

Anne Brooke

Gardeners' World and the Mystery Tree

2010-08-21T01:51:00.000-07:00

Goodness me but we watched Gardeners' World for the first time ever last time. How our lives have changed. We've certainly never been drawn to it before, but what a pleasant little programme - thirty minutes is just about the right length for me, as I couldn't have taken a solid hour of nourishment. It would have been way too frightening. Though I was rather scared when the presenter suggested that you should add urine to your composting bin to improve the flavour (or words to that effect) and then proceeded to show us the bottle that he'd been collecting the team's urine in for this very purpose. The sacrifices one makes for a TV career, eh. But, dear me, I came over all peculiar whilst doing the ironing and had to take some smelling salts. Or would if I had any. Hmm, urinating for the sake of the compost quality would definitely be a boy's job, I feel ...

Anyway, another thing we think we have in our garden is jasmine:

And we now believe (thanks to Sue!) that the Mystery Tree might be a cotoneaster:

At least we believe so, though ours doesn't have any fruit, though K vaguely remembers white flowers earlier on in the summer so we think it must be at least a possibility. The leaves are certainly the same. So thanks, Sue, for this very useful link which helps to identify your trees. Worth its weight in gold really. Meanwhile K is considering taking cuttings from our buddleia so we have lots of little buddleias to go along the fence. Very good for butterflies, but we apparently need lots of clean pots and plastic bags, so won't be able to do that today.

Besides, later on, we're off to Glyndebourne for the opera, yes indeed, but we're taking the opportunity to admire the rather beautiful gardens and maybe even get some ideas, ho ho.

In addition, my golfing partner, Marian (thanks, Marian!) has suggested the possibility of garden courses at Merrist Wood, though they do look rather too high-powered for us at our current stage - maybe they'll do beginners' courses at some point? She also says that our local garden centre, Secretts, has a woman who occasionally runs beginners' gardening courses. Will definitely have to keep an eye out for them ...

Anne Brooke

A mystery tree

2010-08-20T00:55:00.000-07:00

K has been doing more research on our potential new garden and we have a tree in the middle of it and we have absolutely no idea what it is. Here are photos - please can anyone help?

If anyone can shed any light on this, I'd be really grateful! Thank you. Don't forget to admire the newly cut-down grass in the first photo - it was 3 times the height last week! Well done for this to K.

In the meantime, we've discovered that we have an elder tree, and a clematis fighting for domination in the muddle behind the summer house, along with a few other things. The clematis is on the wire fence and we were thinking of getting rid of it, not knowing what it is, but now we know we're planning to keep it. If we replace the wire fencing (ah, plans, plans!...) with a trellis fence, then it should be able to go up there. Shouldn't it? I hope so anyway. We don't want a solid fence anyway as it cuts off the view to the wood. The only problem is trying to discourage the deer in the wood from coming into the garden too often - they're beautiful indeed, and magical to spot one in the mornings - but now we're potential garden-owners, then our view of the local wildlife is changing somewhat. They certainly did ruin the neighbour's lovely roses, and I do so love roses, so hope we can somehow reintroduce them into the garden. Ooh, and sunflowers would be nice too - I really like them. No idea if we can grow them here though. We think the soil is the well-draining loamy variety (which is good, I think) but we're not sure. It's certainly not very clay-like. And not so sandy either.

There's also a rather pretty blue flowering plant in the bed next to the fence, which we've discovered is a plumbago. Yes, that is apparently a real name. Here's one:

Ain't it beautiful? Other good news is that the heuchera are still there on Day 2 of their planting. Good old Georgie and Rose - I just knew they'd be troopers. They had that look about them in the shop. What we need, you see, are plants that are good with beginner gardeners and know how to handle our fumblings. We can't be doing with prima donna plants - way way too terrifying ... The only issue I have with G & R now is exactly how much I need to water them to encourage the roots to grow (which is what the book says - see below). I'm thinking maybe every couple of days, depending on the weather, but if anyone thinks that's wrong please do say!

By the way, the book we're relying on most to help us through the terrifying learning process is the very readable and highly useful How To Garden which we bought at Wisley, and which has a very reassuring front cover:

Perfect for beginners in that it gives great information in a non-scary/technical way. And there's lots of pictures about what is a plant and how to dig, tools you should have and what soil is etc etc. Just what we need indeed.

We are now pondering the further mysteries of compost bins and what to do with them. Apparently two small ones are better for a small garden rather than one large one that takes an age to fill. And at least it will be something to do with that mess we're creating behind the summer house, hey ho.

Anne Brooke

By heuchera or by creuchera

2010-08-18T12:38:00.000-07:00

This is going to be my garden blog. Which may come as a great surprise to anyone who knows me, but yes, after years of ignoring or even hating gardens, I now actually have a garden. Or the promise of one (depending on whether we can finally buy the flat we're after or not). To a couple who've not done any gardening at all of any significance this is a bit of a shock. Whole lifestyle changes beckon just over the horizon depending on mortgages and deeds and a whole variety of stuff it's too dull to go into. I can almost smell the hedges and the grass. Or would if it weren't just so damn dry in spite of the torrential rain we've been having.

And actually we're getting rather excited. Focusing on the chance of having a real life garden for the first time in our 17-year-old marriage is taking our minds off other flat-buying worries. This weekend, we even found ourselves in a garden centre actually buying plants. Wonders will never cease. This is sort of okay as the flat vendors have said it's fine for us to tidy the garden as we live so near it anyway, they know us and the flat is unlived in at the moment.

We bought two heuchera: a Georgia Peach (the first photo) and a Midnight Rose (the second).

We love the leaves and these were recommended by a friend (thanks, Robin). Yesterday we even planted them, just to see if we could as we've never planted anything before in our lives. K bought fertiliser and plant improver pellets and we spent several minutes digging the main bed with our brand-new fork and trowel (stainless steel, as that's what the books say is best). I then spent fruitless moments trying to get the dang things out of the pot, but luckily K has been paying more attention to the books than I have and apparently plants slide easily out of pots. Indeed they do. Hurrah! So Georgia Peach and Midnight Rose are now in the bed nearest the back fence and looking very new. Tonight I even watered them and wandered round the garden for a few moments feeling very Earth Goddess, but then had to go inside and sort out tea while K pruned. How I do love watching my husband work from the kitchen - it's pleasingly domestic.

Anyway, to the garden (should we get it, that is): it's the back section of the garden belonging to the block of flats we currently live in. The front section belongs to the ground floor flat. Our (or hopefully our) section of the garden is 16 of K's paces times 16. A perfect square. In it there's half a shed (straddling the dividing line and shared by the ground floor and 1st floor flats), a summer house (ie a shed with windows, really), two borders and two-and-a-half beds. Not to mention several trees, some stragglier than they ought to be. As the garden for a variety of reasons has been neglected over the past few months, the grass has been like a meadow for some time, but K went to it with his new pair of sheers at the weekend and it's tidier now, though still needs a good mow. We won't be doing that until (a) we've actually got the flat and (b) we can get hold of a mower, either petrol or with a hell of a long flex. And I do mean long. While K was sheering, I pruned the rosemary bushes, which were taking over their domains and some. Thank goodness for my new gardening gloves. I also pruned the buddleia on the back fence so we have created a rubbish pile behind the summer house. My what fun, and actually I did enjoy it.

I almost feel like a gardener. A very very new one. Tonight I stared at the heucheras which are still there and look okay. How do you tell if a plant is okay? Really it's a mystery but I am now worrying about them as if they were children, and I don't even like children. Most odd. Georgie and Rose I'm beginning to call them - even more worrying ...

In the meantime, we have wild and ridiculous plans - a water feature? A gazebo? A new summerhouse? A small gravel section? Stepping stones? New trees?? The plot thickens, and all the time I must remember that no it's not quite ours yet, and it's north facing but quite sloping so catches the sun a fair amount, but what is one supposed to do with that? Perhaps best to concentrate on getting the deeds in our hot little hands and keeping that grass - not to mention the rosemary and mint - under control.

Anne Brooke